The Palace (Bell Mountain Series #6) by Lee Duigon Read Free Book Online Page A

it.
     
    Jandra sat on a stump. At her feet, as though to guard her, stood a most unsightly creature—a bird in dirty purple plumage, with sharp teeth in its beak and a long, stiff tail that was like a snake with feathers. She’d found it, no one knew where, when Helki first brought her to the forest. It never left her side. It hissed at most people, and no one but Jandra cared to touch it. Just now it eyed the frog on Helki’s finger as if it had a mind to snap it up, but it made no move to do so.
     
    “Can I hold the frog?” Jandra said.
     
    “Maybe. Hold out your hand, sweet. He might get scared and jump away, so don’t you fuss if he does. He’s only a frog and doesn’t know any better.”
     
    The hideous toothed bird watched the transfer with keen interest. The green frog sat on Jandra’s palm, apparently content. The little girl giggled with delight. “He’s tickly!” she said. “Tickly frog!”
     
    And then her face suddenly shed its little-girlishness, and she spoke to Helki in a voice that he could never hear without trembling deep inside.
     
    “Flail of the Lord, there is still much work for you to do! For my Word must go to Silvertown, and must be heard across the mountains, and to the uttermost East. And I shall do a thing, which you shall see with your own eyes, to shake the nations of the Heathen, and make the mountains of the East to dance and prance like lambs.”
     
    It was not a child’s voice. It was the voice that had made Ryons a king and Helki his champion.
     
    It passed away like a shadow flitting across a sunlit patch of ground, and there sat Jandra staring bemusedly at the frog in her hand. She never remembered anything God said through her, and usually fell asleep immediately afterward.
     
    “Daddy, I’m tired!” she said, in her ordinary little voice.
     
    “I know, Peep.” Helki gently took the frog from her and released it, and was just in time to catch her as she began to slip sideways from the stump. He picked her up in his arms. As it often did on these occasions, the bird ruffled its feathers and gave a harsh and piercing cry that made all the other birds in the neighborhood suddenly fall silent.
     
    “Yes, I know,” Helki answered it. “The Lord has spoken. And I don’t know what He means.”
     

 
    CHAPTER 7
    To Tempt the King’s Guardians
     
    Merffin Mord did not become the richest man in Obann by being a blockhead. His many successes were due to his always having a clear vision of what he wanted, and then bending all his powers to getting it.
     
    He wanted Obann back the way it used to be, ruled by oligarchs—but this time with himself as their chief—ruled by the Temple, and without a king. The Temple was indispensable. It kept the people contented with the way things were. Moreover, the Temple ought to be ruled by a First Prester who was hand-in-glove with the High Council of the Oligarchs: who was one of them, as Lord Reesh was, sharing in their vision of stability and working closely with the council to govern the nation. Lord Orth, Merffin reflected, would never be that kind of First Prester. But Goryk Gillow would.
     
    Merffin wanted no king in Obann, but for the time being, there were two kings, and no one knew which was which. Merffin would have gambled that the real king was the feebleminded boy who’d fled to Durmurot with Gurun, the so-called queen. But he never gambled if he could avoid it. The thing to do, he thought, was to rid Obann of both the kings at once. Then it wouldn’t matter which was which.
     
    He discussed this confidentially with Aggo the wine merchant, the one man on the council whom he recognized as having a mind nearly equal to his own. Merffin invited Aggo to his townhouse for a sumptuous dinner, highlighted by some of Aggo’s most exquisite wine. After sating themselves, they adjourned to Merffin’s private office behind a closed door, with strict orders given to the servants not to disturb them.
     
    “Are you